supplier responsibility

'supplier responsibility' Articles

Apple today said it is "urgently investigating" a report that claims Apple Watch manufacturer Quanta Computer has subjected teenage students to illegal work conditions at its factory in the Chinese city of Chongqing.
"We are urgently investigating the report that student interns added in September are working overtime and night shifts," Apple said, in a statement issued to CNN. "We have zero tolerance for failure to comply with our standards and we ensure swift action and appropriate remediation if we discover code violations."
In a report last week, Hong Kong labor rights group Students and Scholars Against Corporate Misbehavior said Quanta was "using significant numbers of student workers aged 16-19 years" to assemble the Apple Watch, under working conditions that do not comply with Chinese regulations or Apple's own standards.
Based on an investigation during the summer of 2018, SACOM found that many students were forced to complete internships at Quanta, or face the risk of delayed graduation. The internships were often unrelated to each student's field of study, and lacked an educational component, according to the findings.
"Our school told us that we will be deferred if we don't do the internship," said a student majoring in early education. "If we resign then we will also receive our graduation certificate half a year later than others."
The report also found that students were often illegally required to work at least a few hours of overtime per day and overnight shifts.
In its statement, Apple said it audited Quanta's factory in

Apple today announced the launch of a $300 million investment fund in China which is designed to connect Apple's suppliers with renewable energy sources.
Apple, along with 10 initial suppliers, is investing $300 million into the China Clean Energy Fund over the course of the next four years. Apple says the fund will invest in and develop clean energy projects totaling more than 1 gigawatt of renewable energy in China, which is equivalent to powering close to 1 million homes.
Apple's new fund will be managed by DWS Group, a company that specializes in sustainable investments. DWS also plans to invest in the fund.
"At Apple, we are proud to join with companies that are stepping up to address the climate challenge," said Lisa Jackson, Apple's vice president of Environment, Policy and Social Initiatives. "We're thrilled so many of our suppliers are participating in the fund and hope this model can be replicated globally to help businesses of all sizes make a significant positive impact on our planet."According to Apple, the China Clean Energy Fund will provide participates with the advantage of greater purchasing power and the ability to attain "more attractive and diverse" clean energy solutions.
Participating suppliers include Catcher Technology, Compal Electronics, Corning Incorporated, Golden Arrow, Jabil, Luxshare-ICT, Pegatron, Solway, Sunway Communication, and Wistron.
Apple earlier this year announced that all of its facilities around the world are powered by 100 percent renewable energy, a milestone achievement for the company.
To hit that goal,

Apple and its manufacturing partner Foxconn have confirmed instances of students working overtime to assemble the iPhone X, and both companies are now taking remedial action, as reported by the Financial Times.
A technician inspecting iPhone components at a factory
Apple conducted an audit and confirmed "instances of student interns working overtime at a supplier facility in China," according to the report. "We've confirmed the students worked voluntarily, were compensated and provided benefits, but they should not have been allowed to work overtime," it added.
Foxconn said that "all work was voluntary and compensated appropriately," but admitted that the interns "did work overtime in violation of our policy," which reportedly prohibits interns working more than 40 hours per week.
The statements from Apple and Foxconn come after six high school students told the Financial Times they routinely work 11-hour days assembling the iPhone X at Foxconn's factory in Zhengzhou, China."We are being forced by our school to work here," said Ms Yang, an 18-year-old student training to be a train attendant who declined to use her first name for fear of punishment. "The work has nothing to do with our studies." She said she assembled up to 1,200 iPhone X cameras a day.The students, aged 17 to 19, reportedly said they were told that a three-month stint at the factory was required "work experience" that they had to complete in order to graduate from Zhengzhou Urban Rail Transit School.
Foxconn is believed to hire a significant number of seasonal workers each year to assemble

Apple has been designated the "clear leader" in its methods of supporting a conflict-free minerals trade throughout its supply chain. The title was awarded to the company in a report published by the Enough Project, called the 2017 Conflict Minerals Company Rankings, in which Apple sits at the #1 spot. Rounding out the top 5 spots are Alphabet/Google at #2, HP at #3, Microsoft at #4, and Intel at #5.
The new Conflict Minerals Company Rankings look at 20 of the world's largest companies in two of the industries that the Enough Project says "consume the most" tin, tungsten, tantalum, and gold: consumer electronics and jewelry retail. These minerals are referred to as conflict minerals because they're most often related to being sourced within war-torn countries that mine the minerals with little to no respect for workers' rights.
Chart via the Enough Project
The Enough Project gathered these top 20 companies and awarded points to each based on the policies and practices that they enact regarding responsible mineral sourcing, with the lowest on the list designated as companies most in need of "considerable and urgent need for more action." In total, the companies were ranked based on four core categories:
- Conducting Conflict Minerals Sourcing Due Diligence and Reporting
- Developing a Conflict-Free Minerals Trade and Sourcing Conflict-Free Minerals from Congo, Particularly Gold
- Supporting and Improving Livelihoods for Artisanal Mining Communities in Eastern Congo
- Conflict-Free Minerals Advocacy In its full report, Apple is placed in the "Outstanding Company

New York University graduate student Dejian Zeng spent last summer working in a Pegatron factory manufacturing the iPhone 6s and 7 as part of a summer project, where he got a first hand look at what factory life is like for a worker in China.
Zeng did a extensive, detailed interview with Business Insider, where he shared his experience and offered up an inside glimpse at how factories like Pegatron work.
When he first arrived at the factory, Zeng's job was in final assembly. His sole task was to put a sticker on the back of the iPhone 6s and add a screw, over and over again, a process that he said was "very boring."
Employees at Pegatron are not allowed to bring in electronic devices, so there's no entertainment like music. Strict security measures are in place, including metal detectors, preventing outside devices from entering the factory.
While Zeng started out assembling the iPhone 6s, the factory switched over to the iPhone 7 in August ahead of its September launch, providing an interesting look at how security ramps up when an unreleased device is being manufactured.
According to Zeng, once the iPhone 7 was in trial production, the sensitivity of the metal detectors was ramped up, with no metal, including the metal of underwire bras, allowed through. Two security checks were also required, and new assembly line infrastructure had to be built. Apple employees were also on hand to keep an eye out for issues.When we were producing the iPhone 7, they have Apple staff there every single day to monitor the process because it's a new product they want to

Apple today released its 2017 Supplier Responsibility Progress Report, outlining progress that the company has made in its supply chain by highlighting its "highest ever" work hour compliance, advocating the success of Apple's Supplier Education Program, and celebrating more than 2.4 million workers who were trained on their rights last year. Apple releases such progress reports each year as a transparent move to show the strides it takes to improve the work lives of its device manufacturing employees, who work to create products including the iPhone, iPad, Mac, and more.
The company said that over the past year it audited 705 total suppliers and discovered that compliance with its 60-hour maximum work week mandate has reached 98 percent, increasing from 97 percent last year. Throughout the year, Apple tripled the number of suppliers taking part in its Energy Efficiency program, leading to the reduction of over 150,000 metric tons of carbon emissions, "the equivalent of taking 31,000 cars off the road for a year."
Apple also said that its successes in supplier responsibility included waste reduction, Clean Water initiatives, and more "responsible sourcing efforts" to expand beyond so-called "conflict minerals" to include cobalt for the first time.
Apple’s responsible sourcing efforts expanded beyond conflict minerals to include cobalt for the first time. For the second year in a row, 100% of Apple’s tin, tungsten, tantalum, and gold (3TG) smelters and refiners are participating in independent third-party audits. Apple has also partnered with numerous NGOs to

Bloomberg has been granted an exclusive look inside a Chinese iPhone manufacturing plant where Apple claimed it has addressed cases of excessive overtime.
Pegatron Corp.'s sprawling facility on the outskirts of Shanghai covers an area equal to 90 football fields and employs some 50,000 people in the iPhone assembly process.
After accusations that employees were forced to work long, grueling hours there, Pegatron and Apple adopted new procedures to keep iPhone assemblers from amassing excessive overtime. By granting a western journalist access to the facility for the first time, both companies appear eager to show how the system works.
Image: Qilai Shen/Bloomberg
In the center of the Pegatron campus is a plaza with a firehouse, police station, and post office. Dotted about are shuttle buses, mega-cafeterias, landscaped lawns, and koi ponds. The grey and brown-hued concrete buildings are meant to evoke traditional Chinese architecture, but the scenes inside them are anything but traditional.
The men and women stare into face scanners and swipe badges at security turnstiles to clock in. The strict ID checks are there to make sure they don't work excessive overtime. The process takes less than two seconds.
After passing through metal detectors to sniff out camera-equipped devices that could be used to leak pictures of unreleased new products, the workers follow arrows on the floor and inspirational posters on the wall. They climb up a stairwell with safety netting draped across the middle, to prevent accidents—or suicide attempts. At a bank of lockers, they

Apple today released its 2016 Supplier Responsibility Progress Report [PDF] and updated its accompanying Supplier Responsibility website to offer a look at its 2015 efforts to improve the lives of the workers that produce and assemble its products.
Apple's focus in 2015 was on cutting down on excessive work hours and addressing bonded and underage labor practices. Work-hour compliance on Apple's 60-hour maximum workweek mandate reached 97 percent, up from 92 percent in 2014.
For its 10th annual progress report, Apple conducted 640 total audits and 21 unannounced audits, plus it closed 250 requests for environment, safety, and labor cases and conducted 25,000 follow-up interviews to ensure employers did not retaliate against workers for participating in Apple audits.
Apple's auditing process, in addition to assessing work conditions and interviewing workers, seeks out core violations like underage workers, involuntary labor, document falsification, retaliation against workers, unsafe working conditions, and significant environmental issues. Noncompliant suppliers are placed on probation and if issues are not addressed immediately, Apple terminates contracts.
In 2015, Apple suppliers paid out $4.7 million to reimburse workers that were contracted through unfair and excessive recruitment fees. Since 2008, Apple has forced its suppliers to pay out more than $25.6 million to workers to put an end to bonded labor.
Apple discovered three instances of child labor in 2015 at a single supplier. When suppliers are found hiring underage employees, they are required

Apple on Wednesday released its 2015 Supplier Responsibility Progress Report [PDF] and updated its Supplier Responsibility website, giving new details on its efforts to improve the lives of the workers that assemble its products.
For its ninth annual progress report, Apple conducted 633 audits covering more than 1.6 million workers in 19 countries, and called an additional 30,000 workers to survey them on working conditions.
One of Apple's main achievements in 2014 was putting an end to bonded labor. In October, the company told all of its suppliers that as of 2015, no worker employed on an Apple line could be charged recruitment fees. Employees have, in the past, faced significant fees levied against them by third-party recruiters, who offer them a job at an Apple factory in exchange for money. In some cases, they lose their passports until they're able to pay the fee.
Apple previously prohibited excessive recruitment fees (defined as anything higher than a month's net wages) and required suppliers to reimburse any such fee, but the new ban goes further, preventing all bonded labor. Any supplier who uses bonded labor will need to repay all foreign contract workers in full going forward if they incur recruitment fees.
Apple also made progress eliminating conflict minerals (those that benefit armed groups associated with human rights violations) from its supply chain. As of 2014, 135 smelters have complied with the Conflict-Free Smelter Program, and another 64 are in the process of verification. Four smelters would not commit to the program, and will be

Earlier this week, BBC One announced plans to air a documentary called Apple's Broken Promises, detailing the factory conditions of the overseas workers who are creating components and assembling the company's iPhones.
Apple's Broken Promises is set to air tonight, but ahead of the documentary's launch, BBC News has published a story outlining what they discovered when they visited Pegatron factories in China and mines in Indonesia.
During the visit, the BBC found that workers at Pegatron factories were forced to put in long hours assembling Apple devices, and that there were violations with ID cards, dormitories, work meetings, and juvenile workers.
Multiple reporters went undercover at the factory as part of the documentary, and one did not receive a day off after working 18 days in a row while another was exhausted by the long hours. There were also workers who were filmed falling asleep during 12-hour shifts.One undercover reporter, working in a factory making parts for Apple computers, had to work 18 days in a row despite repeated requests for a day off.
Another reporter, whose longest shift was 16 hours, said: "Every time I got back to the dormitories, I wouldn't want to move.
"Even if I was hungry I wouldn't want to get up to eat. I just wanted to lie down and rest. I was unable to sleep at night because of the stress."Undercover reporters were forced to do overtime, which is supposed to be voluntary, and the housing conditions were less than desirable, with one reporter subjected to a dormitory where 12 workers shared a single room. Another

One of Apple's suppliers is once again being accused of labor violations, with both Green America and China Labor Watch claiming a Catcher factory in Suqian, China has endangered the health and safety of its workers. Catcher is responsible for producing casings for many of Apple's products, including its MacBooks and iPads.
According to the report [PDF], Catcher has failed to provide adequate protective equipment for employees who handle toxic materials. The floor is said to be littered with aluminum-magnesium alloy shreddings and there are heavy amounts of dust in the air, which poses a health and fire safety risk. There are also locked safety exits preventing workers from leaving quickly during a disaster.
Fires and explosions are a major risk at supplier factories, and explosions at both Pegatron and Foxconn have caused major injuries in the past. At Catcher, workers have reportedly not participated in fire drills and have had poor safety training.
Other violations include student workers working long hours, excessive hours for all workers, forced overtime, and unpaid overtime for workers. Catcher is also said to be discriminating against potential employees based on age and the presence of tattoos."The health and safety violations found in this factory two years in a row are startling," said Elizabeth O'Connell, campaigns director at Green America. "The lack of fire drill training and locked safety exits are inexcusable in a work environment that requires the handling of flammable materials. Additionally, the lack of safety training in this facility and

The Fair Labor Association (FLA) today published a new report examining two factories operated by Apple-supplier Quanta Computer, finding several code violations related to working hours, recruitment policies, compensation, health and safety, and more in August of 2013 [PDF] (via TechCrunch).
Factories examined included a Quanta facility in Shanghai and one in Changshu. Quanta is a long-time Apple partner that manufactures Apple's MacBook Air and much of the rest of the company's Mac lineup.
Violations were found in both locations, with some of the more egregious issues including verbal abuse by supervisors, a hiring fee charged to workers by a broker or labor dispatch agent and long working hours. According to the report, 62 percent of workers in Changshu received no rest day for much of Q4 2012, working as many as 16 days in a row.
Overall score summary of management functions at Changshu
Many workers were also underpaid for sick leave and may have been uncompensated for up to an hour of work each day, based on clock in and clock out times. Some workers were forced into joining the All China Federation of Trade Unions, and there were several safety violations.
Both of the factories fell short of the local requirements for indoor air quality, and neither had easy access to a shower/eyewash station in case of emergency. There was no active worker participation in the Employee Health and Safety committees, and flammable and toxic substances were stored improperly at Shanghai while chemicals at Changshu were not properly monitored.
The Fair Labor Association

International aid organization Baptist World Aid Australia released its Electronics Industry Trends report that examines working conditions for employees throughout the technology supply and manufacturing chain (via ZDNet). Apple was one of the highest-ranking brands in the report, which includes suppliers in all facets of the supply chain starting with mineral extraction and extending to the end stage of product assembly.
According to the report, Apple scored a B+, placing it just below Nokia, which was the leader with a B+ score on the basis of being able to prove it was paying workers a living wage. Paying a living wage was a key metric, with most of the surveyed companies (97 percent) not able to confirm they were paying workers at a rate that would meet their basic needs for food, water and shelter. "Apple's inclusion in the top tier may come as a surprise given the public attention it has received for poor working conditions and child labour at Chinese suppliers like Foxconn and Pegatron. In fact, Apple itself reported finding eight facilities using child labour in 2014," said the report. Apple has made significant progress in addressing poor working conditions in supplier factories, following several high-profile reports of labor violations at manufacturers such as Pegatron and Foxconn. Apple now routinely audits supplier factories and documents working conditions in a yearly report published on the company's Supplier Responsibility section of its website.
Apple has pledged to prevent excessive work hours, unethical hiring policies, and the hiring of

Apple today published its 2014 Supplier Responsibility Report, releasing the results of its supplier audit program for 2013 and confirming that its partners only use ethically sourced tantalum, which is a primary metal used in electronic components that can be also be mined from war-torn regions in Africa.
In January 2014, we confirmed that all active, identified tantalum smelters in Apple’s supply chain were validated as conflict-free by third-party auditors, and we will continue to require all suppliers to use only verified tantalum sources. We know supply chains fluctuate, and we’ll maintain ongoing monitoring of our suppliers’ smelters. Apple's senior vice president of operations Jeff Williams, also spoke to The Wall Street Journal on the matter: In the company's 2014 Supplier Responsibility report published on Wednesday, Apple identified that its suppliers use 20 global smelters or refiners whose tantalum has been verified by third-party auditors as what the industry calls "conflict-free." Jeff Williams, Apple's senior vice president of operations, said the company has had success in pressuring tantalum smelters to agree to a third-party audit because Apple and other consumer electronics firms are the biggest users of the metal. The gathering of tantalum, along with other minerals such as gold and tungsten, has become a controversial subject in the tech industry due to their sourcing at mines blamed for funding conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Apple added in its report that it will continue to support conflict-free supply lines and economic

Pegatron, the factory that produces Apple's iPhone 5c, has implemented facial recognition technology to pre-screen potential employees ahead of hiring in order to prevent the company from hiring underage workers, reports The Wall Street Journal.
Underage workers pose a serious threat to Apple suppliers as Apple has a strict policy against the hiring of workers under 16, China's legal working age. Earlier this year, Apple dropped Pingzhou Electronics as a supplier after multiple violations for hiring underage employees.
To screen for underage workers, Pegatron, which implemented the technology earlier this year, reportedly checks government-issued IDs for authenticity, with the faces matched to their ID photos using facial recognition. This is designed to prevent employees from using fake IDs or IDs borrowed from other people.
Last week, a 15-year-old Pegatron factory worker, Shi Zhaokun, died of pneumonia, bringing underage labor violations into the spotlight once again. The employee reportedly used a fake ID to acquire the job, and according to Pegatron, though he too went through the same security checks, he used a fake ID with his actual photo to bypass the facial recognition system.In theory, these measures should keep out underage workers, as they should catch people using fake or borrowed IDs. In Mr. Shi's case, he was able to obtain a government-issued ID card that included his photo but another person's identifying information, the company said.Apple, which voluntarily joined the Fair Labor Association (FLA) back in 2012, sent a team of doctors to

The Fair Labor Association has published a final status report on the working conditions at Apple supplier Foxconn, finding that Foxconn successfully reduced working hours to comply with the Fair Labor Association's standard 60 hour work week, but failed to meet the Chinese legal limit of 49 hours per week and at times, exceeded the legal limit of 36 hours of overtime per month.
Today's report follows an initial audit that took place in February of 2012 and a later agreement in March where Foxconn agreed to examine worker pay and implement stricter control over working hours while also improving working conditions.
Over the course of 2013, the Fair Labor Association visited three Foxconn facilities in Longhua, Guanlan, and Chengdu, with Foxconn providing full cooperation and unrestricted access to both facilities and workers during the verification process. Along with improving working hours, Foxconn also made moves to install additional exits and bathroom facilities.FLA assessors verified that workers at the Longhua and Chengdu facilities worked no more than 60 hours every week between March and October; the same was true in the Guanlan facility with the exception of seven weeks during this period when working hours exceeded 60 hours. The assessment found that between March and October 2013, on average more than half of the workforce had worked beyond the Chinese legal limit of 36 overtime hours per month in all three facilities.
FLA assessors found that no interns had been engaged at any of the three facilities since the January 2013 verification visits and

Chinese labor rights group China Labor Watch (CLW) is calling for answers from primary Apple supplier Pegatron after the death of five young workers in recent months, highlighted by the passing of a fifteen year old factory worker due to pneumonia related causes in October, reports The New York Times. The laborer, Shi Zhaokun, was able to secure a job at a Pegatron factory producing the iPhone 5c by presenting a fake ID stating that he was 20, reportedly working a total of 280 hours in his only month at the company. Apple’s supplier responsibility statement bars employees of supplier companies in China from working more than 60 hours a week; so does Chinese law. But Mr. Shi worked 79 hours in his first week, 77 in his second and 75 in his third, all apparently in violation of the law, according to documents provided by his family.
Pegatron said that the work logs the family kept are records of when the young man clocked in and out, and may not include breaks. The company said his hours did not exceed the legal limit.
A Pegatron spokeswoman said that the death of the worker was “not related to the workplace environment“, while Apple has not officially commented on the incident. In July, China Labor Group alleged numerous safety and workplace violations at Pegatron, including the unethical holding of worker pay and identification cards, as well as poor living conditions within the factory including tight living quarters and packed cafeterias. Apple replied to the allegations, confirming various labor violations and vowing to investigate the incident.
Recently, Hong

Hong Kong-based nonprofit Students & Scholars Against Corporate Misbehaviour (SACOM) has brought forth allegations (via Reuters) of major labor issues at Chinese factories belonging to Biel Crystal, a Hong-Kong based display supplier to Apple.
The workers rights group accuses the company of labor violations, such as forced 11-hour shifts, seven days a week, with only one day off each each month. Other accusations include the inadequate compensation to workers when they are injured, with employees reportedly required to sign blank contracts. The report also states that five workers at a company factory have committed suicide since 2011.
Apple also commented on the new accusations towards Biel Crystal: "We insist that our suppliers provide safe working conditions, treat workers with dignity and respect, and use environmentally responsible manufacturing processes wherever Apple products are made," Apple said in a statement sent to Reuters in response to the SACOM report. Biel Crystal employs more than 60,000 workers and has two factories in the Chinese provinces of Guangdong and Shenzhen. The new accusations also come after a number of alleged labor violations at Apple suppliers earlier this year, including reported workers rights issues at iPhone 5c supplier Jabil Circuit and primary supplier Pegatron. Apple also later issued a statement on the labor controversies surrounding Jabil Circuit, pledging to investigate.
Apple announced in July that it was forming an academic advisory board for its Supplier Responsibility program, saying that it wanted to ensure

In a lengthy piece detailing the hardships that workers in Apple's supply chain can face, Bloomberg follows the story of a factory worker at Flextronics International, a contract manufacturer based in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur that produced camera parts for the iPhone 5.
Ahead of the launch of the iPhone 5, Flextronics had to significantly ramp up production, hiring a 1,500 new employees via brokers and recruiters in Nepal, Malaysia, and surrounding areas. Because factory jobs are highly desired, many families pay upfront fees to brokers to acquire the positions, resulting in loans that can take "imported" workers years to pay off, with factory managers controlling when workers are able to leave.
Inside a Flextronics factory in Fort Worth, Texas. Courtesy of The Wall Street Journal For the iPhone 5 rollout, a recruiter working for Flextronics contacted four brokers in Kathmandu, Nepal's capital, in late August and early September, urgently seeking 1,500 men to make cameras, according to three of the four brokers. The pressure to move so many men so quickly was unprecedented. "The recruitment agency was telling me, 'We need these workers, you have to send them by today,'" says Rajan Shrestha, managing director of a small company called Sharp Human Resources.The frenzy to hire workers was how one Nepalese man, Bibek Dhong, found himself paying $250 and handing over his passport to a recruiter who promised him a good job. Dhong was forced to pay another $500 to a broker (6 months of his wages from his former job as a dairy farmer) and sign a debt agreement stating he

Apple has formed an academic advisory board for its Supplier Responsibility program to assist with the company's goals to provide "safe and ethical working conditions wherever its products are made."All research that is commissioned by the advisory board or done directly by its members will be subject to the highest academic standards. It is expected that that the new research will result in publicly available working papers, as well as published articles in professional journals. Locke hopes that the board will shape the practices of Apple and its suppliers so that the millions of employees involved in Apple's supply chain work under safe and fair conditions, in which "they are paid living wages, work within the legal work hour regimes, [and] work in environments that are safe and where they can express their rights as citizens."The board, made up of 8 professors from American universities, will:- Study and make recommendations to Apple about current policies and practices- Conduct or commission new research on labor standards within Apple's supply chain- Share existing research which may help improve those policies and practicesThe eight professors on the board are Richard Locke (Brown University), Chair Mark Cullen (Stanford University), Eli Friedman (Cornell University), Mary Gallagher (University of Michigan), Margaret Levi (University of Washington), Dara O'Rourke (University of California, Berkeley), Charles Sabel (Columbia University) and Annelee Saxenian (University of California,

MacRumors attracts a broad audience
of both consumers and professionals interested in
the latest technologies and products. We also boast an active community focused on
purchasing decisions and technical aspects of the iPhone, iPod, iPad, and Mac platforms.